Food Truck Regulations in Columbus

[Coy]

Any list of where the spots are located?

You’d think that city officials considered proximity to b&m locations… you’d think…

[leftovers]

joev said:
What’s disappointing? They now have public parking spaces to set up in, which they did not have before.

They are first come first served and shared by with regular parking. That system is rife with problems. This is avoided in other cities with a rotating lottery system. There are also other issues mentioned in this thread.

[melikecheese]

I think this is a good first step, remember this is a pilot program, 16 spaces. Yes its small, because it’s a pilot program.

Sometimes you take small steps instead of trying to release a perfect product day 1.

[leftovers]

melikecheese said:
I think this is a good first step, remember this is a pilot program, 16 spaces. Yes its small, because it’s a pilot program.

Sometimes you take small steps instead of trying to release a perfect product day 1.

The issue is not about it being small. They aren’t even getting enough trucks to apply for the program. The issue is that the test is flawed. In many cities rotating spaces are alloted by lottery. That way a truck knows that it can prepare the food necessary for a days sales at a particular location. It also avoids conflict of multiple trucks circling a spot or of people parking in a spot to save or sell it to trucks. Those are all types of issues that have occurred and been worked out in other cities. There is no need for Columbus to reinvent the wheel or have a pilot program that does not garner food truck interest because of those reasons. These shortcomings do not make it a fair test of how food trucks can work in the city.

[AlanBarber]

I can understand the council trying to take a hand off approach to the day to day handling of the food trucks but the first come first serve is a terrible idea. It’s only matter of time before we see in the news of two truck owners getting into a fight over a spot.

Not that my opinion matters but I think that doing something like boston where they run a lottery to randomly schedule trucks spots for the next 3 months would work well.

It saves trucks from fighting for the spots, prevents wasting fuel driving around to find open spots, makes it easier to plan staff levels, amount of food to prep for the day and makes it easier for routine inspections to be performed.

[MRipley]

AlanBarber said:
It saves trucks from fighting for the spots, prevents wasting fuel driving around to find open spots, makes it easier to plan staff levels, amount of food to prep for the day and makes it easier for routine inspections to be performed.

Seems to me that having deal with those issues are a choice that mobile food vendors make when they decide to go mobile. Otherwise, maybe they should consider investing in a B&M location.

[leftovers]

The rotating lottery system does not eliminate the advantages of a B&M restaurant, it mainly helps to reduce strife and infighting amongst the trucks.

[MRipley]

leftovers said:
The rotating lottery system does not eliminate the advantages of a B&M restaurant, it mainly helps to reduce strife and infighting amongst the trucks.

Ok, so if the main benefit is to reduce the chance of a tasty curb side food fight, then the other factors cited (“prevents wasting fuel driving around to find open spots, makes it easier to plan staff levels, amount of food to prep for the day and makes it easier for routine inspections to be performed.”) aren’t really a problem.

[DavidF]

Honestly, I see this as designed to fail. I can only assume a lot of the brick and mortar places downtown (that are more likely to be on good terms with council) aren’t exactly thrilled by the trucks. Creating a “pilot” program with a ton of obstacles is a great way to come back in 6 months and claim there wasn’t enough interest to warrant developing a more comprehensive system.

[joev]

Maybe I’m not understanding – is there anything to change the fact that food trucks can continue to operate on private property the way they have been?

[mrpoppinzs]

DavidF said:
Honestly, I see this as designed to fail. I can only assume a lot of the brick and mortar places downtown (that are more likely to be on good terms with council) aren’t exactly thrilled by the trucks. Creating a “pilot” program with a ton of obstacles is a great way to come back in 6 months and claim there wasn’t enough interest to warrant developing a more comprehensive system.

+1

[DouginCMH]

DavidF said:
Honestly, I see this as designed to fail. I can only assume a lot of the brick and mortar places downtown (that are more likely to be on good terms with council) aren’t exactly thrilled by the trucks. Creating a “pilot” program with a ton of obstacles is a great way to come back in 6 months and claim there wasn’t enough interest to warrant developing a more comprehensive system.

Perhaps.

Or maybe they’ve just come up with a not-very-good plan.

Lots of cities have struggled to deal with appropriate, creative regulation of food trucks/carts. The conspiracy theorist in me is tempted to believe that there’s a Columbus cabal to kill mobile food in the city. But the more thoughtful me assumes the city of just struggling to get it right; to strike a balance between the legitimate interests of these new entrepreneurs, B&M restauranteurs, and people looking for parking spaces downtown. Maybe they’ll never get it right, but that doesn’t mean they want to pull the rug out from under the food truck boom.

In the meantime, I’ll see you at Seventh Son, the St. James and other food truck-friendly establishments. And while I’m no raving capitalist, maybe a stumbling effort on the part of the city to manage the growth of food trucks here will result in a more creative response from the private sector, i.e., more Dinin’ Hall kinds of establishments.

[DavidF]

DouginCMH said:
Perhaps.

Or maybe they’ve just come up with a not-very-good plan.

Lots of cities have struggled to deal with appropriate, creative regulation of food trucks/carts. The conspiracy theorist in me is tempted to believe that there’s a Columbus cabal to kill mobile food in the city. But the more thoughtful me assumes the city of just struggling to get it right; to strike a balance between the legitimate interests of these new entrepreneurs, B&M restauranteurs, and people looking for parking spaces downtown. Maybe they’ll never get it right, but that doesn’t mean they want to pull the rug out from under the food truck boom.

In the meantime, I’ll see you at Seventh Son, the St. James and other food truck-friendly establishments. And while I’m no raving capitalist, maybe a stumbling effort on the part of the city to manage the growth of food trucks here will result in a more creative response from the private sector, i.e., more Dinin’ Hall kinds of establishments.

Oh, I don’t think they are in any way trying to kill food trucks. I think they are doing the best they can to avoid having to wade into this issue at all. It’s a very thorny issue with very few political upsides.

[Anonymous]

Food truck owners and Jim, Bethia, et al are curiously absent from this conversation today. My biggest gripe would be the exclusion of big (Ajumama) food (Ajumama) trucks (Ajumama Ajumama). I didn’t find it referenced anywhere in recent articles.
It’s hard for me to imagine more opportunities for food trucks to be a bad thing.
(One more Ajumama for posterity).

[Walker Evans]

joev said:
Maybe I’m not understanding – is there anything to change the fact that food trucks can continue to operate on private property the way they have been?

Yeah, this program doesn’t change anything that is already happening to much success in many instances. It’s giving them a new option of parking meter locations, whether it be an ideal option or not.

[Author]

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